


Across the Street

by DiazTuna



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate season 7, Canon Divergence, Cursed, F/F, Hyperion Heights, swanqueen - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-03
Updated: 2018-09-03
Packaged: 2019-07-06 08:21:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15882222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DiazTuna/pseuds/DiazTuna
Summary: A light goes on across the street, the same as every morning. Roni is home from the bar. She kicks out the men not too long after one, sometimes their begging wakes her up. But Roni always turns on her light at this hour. Jean doesn't know why and doesn't care to find out. Years ago they had a falling out and they are both too stubborn to even remember what it was about. What she does know is that there are doughs that need cutting and marking and she can't linger too much on bar owners she doesn't care about.--Alternate season 7 in which Emma is cursed to be a baker in Hyperion Heights across the street from Roni's.





	Across the Street

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rexinasofia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rexinasofia/gifts), [Grevling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Grevling/gifts).



> This isn't my best timing and I meant to have finished WAY before I did. It sort of became longer than it was meant to be and here we are! Thanks to Cass and Swati for reading. AND TO BAILEY because we screamed at each about Maggie Gyllenhaal and Emma being an angry baker. 
> 
> TW: some clashes with gentrifiers that portray racism and prejudice.

Jean always gets up at four. She doesn't need an alarm, she can smell the yeast of her raising doughs through her unpolished floors. She likes that way. It's her favourite time of day, with the dimming orange of the streetlight coming through her window. The baby begins stirring in her crib. Hope keeps to her schedule too, maybe it's also the yeast that wakes her.

 

“Hey there baby,” She whispers when her daughter stretches her arms towards her. “Ready for the day?”

 

Hope kicks and gurgles and Jean knows that two more minutes in her diaper will have her hollering. She picks her up and lays her on the old table she’d turned into a diaper changing station. A light goes on across the street, the same as every morning. Roni is home from the bar. She kicks out the men not too long after one, sometimes their begging wakes her up. But Roni always turns on her light at this hour. Jean doesn't know why and doesn't care to find out. Years ago they had a falling out and they are both too stubborn to even remember what it was about. What she does know is that there are doughs that need cutting and marking and she can't linger too much on bar owners she doesn't care about.

 

“Right, time for work.” Jean says as she secures her daughter’s diaper.

 

It’s good work, really. She’s been doing it for as long as she can remember. Maybe she’d been sixteen when she first starting doing it. Jean can't really remember that time of her life. But it feels like she has been wearing her apron in Hyperion Heights forever. Now that she has Hope she appreciates it more. She can give her a bath in the kitchen sink and know that the bread is ready because she tilts her head to the smell coming from the oven. Jean can set her down in a pen behind her counter and watch her. Watch her wondering who is that she looks like, with her dark hair and skin that makes her own look too milky. Thinking how easily Belfrey could take this away from her makes her stomach churn every morning. How her old walls with the mortar popping out and pipes that are too loud could become character items for a different place. One that charges people five dollars for their coffee and two for a cookie that doesn’t have eggs or flour in it.

 

“Jean!” Comes a voice as her doorbell clinks. Her first client is always the same.

 

“Hey Lucy.”  She greets her with a smile and already wrapping a spiced cream cheese bagel for her. “Heard about you running away.”

 

“I found my dad,” Lucy says like she’s talking about a rock she found on the beach.

 

Jean almost drops the bagel all together and Hope giggles in the back, like she understands she’s supposed to be amused.

 

“You what?! How..what. How?” She hands it over before she actually ruins it.

 

“He wrote a book for me to find him.” Lucy reaches into her school bag and puts a beaten down paperback on the counter. _Once Upon a Time. Henry D. Mills._ Jean doesn’t know why a knot forms in the back of her throat. She reaches to dog eared book but thinks better of it. She doesn’t want to know.

 

“Lucy, tell me you didn’t go a stranger’s place and…” She says

 

“Put my life in mortal danger and drag him down here with me?” Lucy bites a chunk of her bagel. “Yeah. Mom, Auntie Sabine AND Roni already yelled at me for it.”

 

 _Roni_. Jean doesn’t understand why that weighs on her, the way Lucy recites their names like part of a unit. One she doesn’t have a role in, one she wasn’t invited to. But she’s just the neighborhood baker who is lucky enough to manage rent every month. She’s nothing more.

 

“Good. Don’t do that again. Your mom’s too young for a heart attack.” She tries to laugh it off.

 

“You should meet him sometime, Jean.” Lucy says her name like she’s supposed to doubt it. And maybe she does, for a second. Like she does when she’s drifting off to sleep and for a moment thinks someone should be lying beside her.

 

“Meet him? You mean he didn’t just leave?” She furrows her brow worried that this man might be dangerous. Jean thinks of the crowbar she keeps under the counter.

 

“Nope.” She says triumphantly. “I have a feeling he’ll be a regular at Roni’s now.” Sometimes there is something so familiar about Lucy. It could be how she rocks herself on her heels or puts her hands in her pockets. Jean thinks of a mirror for a split second before she chastises herself on the thought. _It’s ridiculous._ Lucy is just a neighborhood kid. And right now she’s smiling like she knows all her secrets.

 

“Roni’s, huh?” Jean eyes flicker to the book again. “If he feels like a spiced cheese bagel someday I might meet him but until then...”

 

“Ugh.” She says exasperated and grabs her book from the counter. “You’re just gonna make this harder than it needs to be.”

 

“What?” Jean blinks at her completely thrown.

 

“Though I guess it wouldn’t be much of a story if it were that easy,” She zips up her bag and that stubborn determination sends a pang of nostalgia through her. For something she’s never had. “That’s what my dad would say anyway. If he’d remember.”

 

“Lucy. _What_ are you talking about?”

 

“Oops, look at the time! I gotta go!”

 

She silently apologizes through the window as she slams the door closed on her way out.

 

Hope holds herself up by the edge of her pen and makes a sound to make Jean look at her.

 

“I know baby, I’m confused too.”

 

* * *

 

Things don’t change much after that morning, not in a way Jean can easily see anyway. She still fights her supply guy for messing up her order of unbleached flour. The red bandana on her forehead is still damp by the afternoon. People still come in for sourdough and their rye close to dinner. It’d be easy to avoid looking, to just keep mixing and kneading and feeding her baby in between. She could, Jean supposes she could. Except she’d found herself staring at her phone screen, looking at her shopping cart. _Once Upon a Time. Henry D. Mills._ She’d even found the shortest Wikipedia entry on him, not knowing why she had been hoping for a photograph. Jean ordered the damn book which was stupid thing to do because she’ll never read it. It will probably become a doorstop and end up in Hope’s mouth when she takes to crawling. Jean blames the bad black and white photo of Henry D. Mills. Maybe he reminded her of some boy of her past, one who shared his lunch with her when there hadn’t been a dime in her pocket.

 

It’s the damn book and the photo that have her looking through window, keeping an eye out for a girl and her backpack at Ray’s bodega. It’s why she pretends she isn’t disappointed that Lucy isn’t her first customer anymore. Jean knows better than to spend too much time looking towards Roni’s. Not more than the occasional glance as she’s closing up as Roni’s sign is lighting up. She huffs at the thought of going in there for curiosity’s sake. It’s been _years_ , she doesn’t even remember what it looks like. Some days Jean isn’t sure she remembers what Roni looks like and those days come with a pull of sadness she punches into chilled dough. She doesn’t want to understand it more than she already does. Today is one of those days.

 

Her bell rings as the door clicks open and Jean feels her shoulders relax as she sees Lucy walk in. She’s smiling and dragging someone by the hand. He laughs and Jean recognizes him at once. Henry D. Mills. In color and looking more familiar than she wants him to be.

 

“Jean!” Lucy greets her as she leans against the counter. “Can we get TWO spiced cheese bagels please? “This is my...this is Henry, by the way.” She tries to lift herself up on sheer upper body strength which earns her a look from Henry.

 

Jean can’t help but smile. “It’s always good to see a new face in the bakery.”

 

“She’s been swearing by them for days.” He tells her like she knows her. “Finally got me up early enough to be the first here.”

 

“It’s just not the same if you don’t get them when they’ve just come out! And don’t ever ask a toasted one!” Lucy lectures him. Maybe she did manage to find her father. He chest contracts at the thought. “Right, Jean?”

 

“Right.” She agrees as moves avoiding their eyes. Her hands are quick with the cheese and the bits of jalapeno, her fingers don’t mind the heat of the oven as she pulls two bagels out.

 

“Is it always so quiet in here?” He asks as he looks around. His eyes land on Hope, yawning as she looks at him. “Bet that’s good for a nap though.”

 

“Yeah, lucky for me,” Jean realizes she’s still smiling. “Gets kinda crazy around at lunch but other than that. It’s me and the baby. She can get pretty loud when she wants to.” She doesn’t know what urged her to tell a stranger these things.

 

“I bet.”Lucy suddenly nudges him in the ribs like he’s forgotten something. “ Oh. I. We... Didn’t mean to intrude but it felt wrong to just leave it out there when it looks like rain today.” He lifts a package for her to see. Brown paper and tape hides that it’s his book he’s holding along with Jean’s embarrassment.

 

“Oh. That’s...that’s. Great. Thanks.” Jean stumbles over words as her skin grazes during the second she takes the package.. “It was..nice of you.”

 

She hurries to wrap their order and bag it. The part of her that had ordered the book tells her to keep them talking, keep them here. Because it feels like...it feels like she’s missed them. It’s not something that makes any kind of sense, Jean knows.  Lucy is Jacinda’s daughter, who sometimes lives down the street. And Henry D. Mills is...a walking photograph. Jean is no one to them. She slides the bag towards him as he reaches for his wallet.

 

“Leave it.” She tells him

 

“But…”

 

“Lucy and I have an arrangement.” She nods at Jean’s words and he is just supposed to accept it.

 

“I’ll have to get something else next time I come in,” His ears move slightly as he smiles. It’s like watching Hope with applesauce spread all over her face. “And _pay_ for it.”

 

“Guess you’ll have to, kid.” The words slip too fast for her to catch them. She's barely older than he is and the air turns awkward with that realization.

 

He tilts his head as if they’ve clicked, somehow. Lucy is bouncing with something. Maybe expectation.

 

“I’ll see you around.” He puts a hand on Lucy’s shoulder and nods goodbye to her.

 

With a hand on his book, Jean silently hopes he means that.

 

* * *

 

Henry is a man of his word, Jean learns. Just like the boy in his book. The book she keeps under her counter and the pages have chunks of dried dough here and there. Jean hadn't mean to read it. And it feels like she isn't supposed, like this is a lonely boy's journal. But there is something there, something that makes her flip its pages. It's that same something in Henry's expression every time he comes in. Sometimes he is following Lucy in the mornings but more and more it’s just before closing time. For the last of her grilled cheese and for a soda that isn't too cold. Jean wishes she could pinpoint it, that thing she sees, maybe a lost shine to his eyes. She wishes she had a reason why she suddenly feels incomplete when she nods goodbye as he heads to Roni's with his laptop under his arm.

 

Jean tries to put it in the back of her mind when Hope is splayed over chest and she's reading aloud from Henry’s book. She figures that’s bound to be good for her, to hear her voice like this.

 

_Emma was always a force of nature in his eyes. That sudden wind that comes with a storm and unroots trees from the ground. His mother would have agreed with that not too long ago. She had wanted out her town, out of their lives, before she could destroy what she had spent years building. But Henry thought that perhaps his mother could not picture life without Emma in it. Whatever she felt too stubborn to hide. Not that she knew that._

 

Hope holds on tight to her night shirt and Jean has to breathe as she loses her voice. She keeps re-reading that paragraph, her eyes tracing the letters that make up Emma. Like if it were the first time she read that name, like a kid who just learned how to spell. E-m-m-a. There could have been an Emma in her life, someone she had looked up to. Maybe she had been like Henry’s Emma. The force of nature his mother seems to love. _Regina._ Jean reads the name falling from Emma’s lips with longing. She tosses the book aside to stop that familiar sadness from pulling at her. She kisses the top of her daughter’s head and shuts her light.

 

“You’ve lived here your entire life?” Henry asks her one day with half a sandwich in his mouth.

 

“Not all,” Jean  laughs as she slides a glass bottle his way. “Just as long as I can remember.” She tries and fails to think of the first time she fell off a bike, the first time she crossed a street on her own.  “My memory's a bit fuzzy on the details.”

 

He stifles a laugh and only just keeps from spitting out some of his drink. “You’re lucky Lucy has ballet right now.”

 

“Oh yeah, why?”

 

Henry wipes at his mouth and shakes his head. “She thinks we’re all cursed. Can’t remember who we really are. This would send her through the roof.”

 

“Like in your book.” Jean blurts out and pinches one eye shut.

 

“My book?” He perks up immediately. “You’ve read it?”

 

“I..uh. Not all.” She tries to busy herself with anything but even Hope is soundly asleep, unable to save her. “I’m a slow reader.”

 

“What do you think so far?’

 

“It’s good. I like it.” She manages to sound nonplussed, like she hasn’t underlined bits of it with the pen she uses for her lists and orders. “So what does Lucy say about it?”

 

Henry senses what she’s trying to do, she’s too obvious for subtlety.

 

“She thinks it’s real. That we’re all characters from the Enchanted Forest. Jacinda, Belfrey.” He sucks in a breath and feels a small sting of disappointment. “You.”

 

“Who…” Her voice goes a higher than she’s heard it in a while. Lucy marching in that morning clicks in her memory. “Who does she think I am?”

 

“She has her theories but won't share them,” Henry shrugs and Jean can tell there is some pride there. One he doesn't think he has a right to. “Not until I'm the truest believer again. Apparently I’d only cramp her style.”

 

Jean throws her head back as she laughs, like she has any sort of experience with eleven year olds. “That might just mean she thinks you're a nerd.”

 

“A nerd? Me?” He crumbles the sandwich wrapper. “First Roni and now you. Can't a guy enjoy a little synthwave without being bullied?”

 

“What the hell is synthwave?” She bites her lip ignoring any Roni comparison.  

 

“I walked right into that one, didn't I?”

 

“Yeah. You sorta did.” Jean tosses a rag at him. “Come on. Help me close shop while you're here.”

 

Henry gets to it with too much of a kick in his step. He wipes down the counter, checks the register and writes the day’s total in the notebook she keeps. Jean silently curses the numbers that when crunched tell her she can't afford an extra set of hands. She’s settling Hope into her stroller, ready for the trip down to the grocer’s as Henry locks the door for her.

 

“Thanks, kid.”

 

“Anytime, boss.” He winks as he hands her the keys.

 

“Miss Forrester?” Comes a smarmy voice Jean would recognize anywhere. Belfrey’s messenger man.

 

“What now, Carlisle?” She turns around to find him in his usual three piece suit. Completely out of place on her street.

 

“I’ll ignore your lack of manners for now.” He says handing her an envelope with Belfrey's company logo on it. “I hope you’ll be understanding.”

 

Jean rips the thing open as she openly glares at him.

 

_Dear Miss Forrester,_

 

_I can imagine you have been made aware that real estate in the area has increased in value in the last couple of months. While I do appreciate that you have been a member of the community for many years, you and your neighbors cannot be exempted from the workings of the market. As such, there will be a 30% increase added to your rent. If you are unable to meet this increase you will be ask to vacate the premises._

 

_Yours truly,_

 

_Victoria Belfrey_

 

“What the fuck is this?!” She crushes the letter into a ball tossing it aside. Hope fusses as her temper darkens.

 

“I believe Miss Belfrey's letter was very clear Miss Forrester, I don't feel like I need to explain much further.” Carlisle straightens his jacket. “Now if you will excuse me…”

 

“No, I won't fucking excuse  you.” Jean grabs him by the arm. “You’re going to take me to Belfrey right now.”

 

“But...Miss Forrester! This is highly…”

 

“Inappropriate? I don't care.” Jean looks at Hope in her stroller, arms reaching for her, eyes glazing. She turns to Henry, not knowing what else to do. “Take her, please.”

 

“Of course” He replies with no hesitation.

 

“It won't be long.” She promises letting him take Hope’s stroller. “Start walking Carlisle.”

 

Jean takes a deep breath, not entirely ready for a fight.

 

* * *

 

Roni sighs as she polishes her shot glasses. If she knows her regulars, and she does, at least five of these will go to rum because es azucar no guaro mama. But that's for later, when the air is heavier and the bar has a murmur to it. Right now, the floor is all hers. Still hers, Roni reminds herself with a smirk. Her door opens, too early for anything. Henry Mills, it could only be him. Roni doesn't bother looking up at this point.

 

“You know Mills, one of these days someone's gonna pin you for a drunk.” She says throwing a towel over her shoulder.

 

“I really hope it's not today.” His voice is strangled and a baby's, a _baby’s,_ cries follow it.

 

Roni jerks her head up and maybe runs from the bar towards the door. “You brought a baby here? Into the bar. MY Bar?”

 

He licks his lips and she knows by now that it means he isn't sure about what he's about to say.

 

“It's starting to look like rain and--”

 

“It's Seattle, it always looks like rain!” The baby gets louder right along with her. It isn't an argument she wants to make but if Belfrey were to walk in. Roni doesn't want to think about it.

 

“Jean just took off! It’s not like--”

 

“This is Jean’s baby?! Have you lost your mind?!” She reprimands him not understanding why his full name almost rolled out her tongue like an old habit.

 

“Look I don't know what beef you and Jean have,” Roni scoffs as Henry unstraps the baby from the stroller and begins to sway with her. “But can you put it aside for some 15 minutes? Shhhh..it’s OK. Hope. It's OK.”

 

Roni feels herself shrink at that, pressing her lips together. As if on cue, it begins to pour outside. Henry points to the rain and she rolls her eyes. Roni can't bring herself to look at the baby, she doesn't know why. Or it’s that she knows too well and can't afford to think about that again. Roni only dares to glance at the growing dark hair that is nothing like Jean’s.

 

“Fine. Use the booth by the stairs. Anybody bothers you tell them to go to hell.” She folds over the baby's cries.

 

Henry's promised fifteen minutes come and go. But the baby is still crying. There is only so much she can do standing by the bar, ignoring every urge she can't explain. Roni braces herself with a breath and walks over to the booth she’d given up for them. She finds Henry pulling faces at the baby like a 12 year old babysitting his kid sister.

 

“I’ve tried everything, I swear,” He says apologetically, with his eyes wide. “She doesn't need a diaper change or want her bottle.. She won't go to sleep either…”

 

“She misses her mother.” Roni says failing to keep the emotion off her voice. “Isn’t that right, mi vida?” Her fingers find Hope’s chin on their own.

 

The crying stops suddenly, like Roni just hit pause on it. The baby raises her head towards her, with wet cheeks and stares like she recognizes her. She breaks into a four teeth smile.

 

“Look’s like you got the magic touch.” Henry smiles at her like he’s trying to rope her in.

 

“Could just be luck.” Roni tries backing away but Hope’s chin begins to quiver. The baby extends her arms at her, begging to be picked up. Roni’s helpless. She supposes she always was.

 

“You know how to play your cards, huh.” Roni tells her. She can feel the smile she shouldn't be smiling.

 

Hope immediately starts babbling away in her arms. Like she's filling her on her day and Roni doesn't even mind the snot on her shirt.

 

“That's funny.” Henry rubs his neck while looking at them.

 

“What is?”

 

“She sort of looks like you.”

 

“Don’t be...” Roni begins but cuts herself short looking at Hope. Maybe. The shape of her eyes, her coloring. The small hairs that sticks up behind her ears. The baby buries her forehead in her neck, Roni thinks that she’s stopped breathing.

 

Henry laughs quietly. “Yeah. Thought so.”

 

Roni tries to still her thoughts and erase words like mamá and mija from her mind. Maybe clearing her voice will help.

 

“So, uh why did Jean run out and leave the kid behind?”

 

“She got a letter from Belfrey I think. I assume it was bad.”

 

“30 per cent increase to her rent,” He gives her a prodding look and Roni sighs. “Beto’s four doors down from her. He got his yesterday. I’ve got a half empty bottle of Flor de Plata to prove it.”

 

Roni is lucky that Belfrey can only try to buy her out. Her old man had left her this bar back when it was still Quique’s. She wants to remember it, wants to say it was cumbia he played. Records, not a jukebox. But she can’t be certain, the memories feel like smoke in her mind. Roni tries hard sometimes, when she’s aligning her bottles, to think of the way it smelled. Black coffee and the good tobacco, but she’s making it up half the time.

 

“Well, shit.” He says sinking back into the booth. Roni glares at him because she has a baby in her arms. “Jean went to confront Belfrey over it.”

 

“She would.” Despite herself Roni feels a tug of fondness that Henry catches too quickly. She hates it.

 

“That kind of history, huh?”

 

“Stop getting ideas, Mills.” She puts a hand to Hope’s tiny head, as if trying to shield her from any and all insinuations. Roni can’t even trust her memories to call them crazy, maybe she’s the one who’s a little out of it.

 

“I would if you cleared the air, set the record straight.” Henry raises his eyebrows. “Or not.”

 

“You’re lucky I’m holding a baby right now because…”

 

The door slams open and Jean Forrester is dripping water onto her floors. Soaked enough that white of her cotton shirt sticking to her skin. Her hair looks that real honey color, deeper out of the light. Roni thinks that she’d forgotten, something tells her she had.

 

“What the hell?!” Jean marches towards her. “You brought my baby to this dive?!” She looks accusingly at Henry.

 

“Hey!” Roni protests and Hope giggles seemingly delighted by the rumble in her chest. “You better watch it, Forrester.” It feels good to get her words out, to have Jean direct her eyes at her. Watch them get darker, like she can’t remember if they did. Roni hates how good it feels, her gaze on her.

 

“And what are you doing holding _my_ daughter, Pérez?”  Jean moves to take Hope away and it awakens something old. It makes her snarl and hold the baby tighter to her chest. “Kid, what were you thinking coming here and letting her…”

 

“Letting _me_? That's real rich coming from the likes of you!’

 

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?!”

 

“Hey, hey!” Henry gets between them. “Jean, Jean? Look down at your hands.”

 

She looks like she has been snapped out of trance and she opens her fist to reveal her full key ring. Red flushes her neck and ears in embarrassment when the realization hits that she’d stranded them on the street.

 

“I figured this would be the first place you’d look.”

 

“Seems like you were right.” Jean mumbles putting her keys away, not knowing where to hide. “Uh, can I?” She looks at Roni, her chest heavy with shame.

 

That part of her mind that pulls words she wants to forget wants to keep Hope in her arms, that’s the part she can’t afford to understand. But she isn’t her daughter, no matter how her eyes are shaped. Roni hands her over with a just nod. Hope cries as she leans away from Jean’s arms.

 

“Shhh, shhh it’s OK. We’re going home, it’s OK. It’s OK.” She tries rock her in her arms. “She’s usually not like this.” Judging by her expression this might really be the first time she’s heard her in such distress.

 

“I’ll walk you back.” Henry volunteers, folding up the stroller.

 

“Thanks.” She smiles weakly and for a second Roni thinks it might be directed at her. But it’s been years since they’ve had one kind word for each other. Jean heads towards the door but Roni grabs Henry by the wrist.

 

“There’s an umbrella behind the bar.” She says whispers and slaps his arm when Henry cheekily raises an eyebrow at her. “Get to it.”

 

“Yes, ma’am.” Henry rushes to get it and lifts it up triumphantly as he catches up with Jean and Hope.

 

Roni shakes her head watching them go. It’s like she’s missed them, she thinks before she can help it. It’s one of those thoughts she has at four in the morning when she switches on her light. She doesn’t need to know more.

 

* * *

 

Her name shines green above her as Roni begins her night. Lately she has taken to counting the days, though she can’t say why. But she knows the roughness of the switch has pressed against her thumb a total of ten times since she started. Fifteen of the expensive beers are sold every night, more than before she knows. Roni can’t find the word she’s looking for these days. Where she pretends she doesn’t catch herself looking across the street.

 

“Hey.” Henry startles her by slipping onto his usual bar stool. Roni catches her breath as he cocks his head. “You OK there?”

 

“Yeah. Yeah.”  She throws the rag she’d been holding over her shoulder. “What’s up?”

 

“I am glad you asked.” He smiles like he has a secret as he places her own umbrella on the counter.

 

“Gee, how thoughtful. Five days later.”

 

“I’m not done yet.” Henry presents her with a carefully wrapped package. Roni can smell it, cheddar, apples and ham. There something to it that makes her think of home, one that’s far away from here. And she hasn’t been in a while. “I think someone’s feeling sorry.” He locks his fingers together on the bar like he’s expecting something back.

 

“Please.” She tries to hide it, even as her fingers peel at the wrapper to reveal a warm sandwich. “You ordered this didn’t you? You’re worse than Lucy.”

 

Henry snickers and shakes his head. “This isn’t me, I swear. I’m just following orders.”

 

Roni drops her shoulders and glares at him until he caves.  

 

“Fine. Jean just sort of handed them to me and I filled in the blanks.”

 

“Mhmm. Thought so.” She takes one half of the sandwich and slides the other to Henry. It takes all her strength to keep her knees from buckling when she bites into. She’s melting and she knows it. It’s the thin slice on the apples she blames.

 

“Doesn’t mean I’m wrong.”

 

“Don’t you have a podcast to work on or something?” Roni’s mouth is still half full and she can just see the smirk on Henry’s face.

 

“I’m not wrong.” He repeats confidently.

 

There has always been something about Henry. The way he talks about things, like he has faith in them. In her, most often. She feels so transparent around him, she doesn’t mind it. But today Roni wishes he’d look away because he’s seen too much and he might be right about her. About them.

* * *

 

Roni is still counting the days, crossing them out in her mind for no reason she knows. But it’s good for keeping count of how many times Henry Mills has walked in with something from Jean’s. A week and he is still swearing he isn’t paying for any sandwiches, bread or muffins. Roni doesn’t know what to do with that, except try and keep her head down whenever she’s opening up.It never works. There’s something the matter with her but she can’t dwell. Won’t dwell. She sighs fishing for change in her back pocket.

 

“It’s three fifty for those blues.” Ray says without looking away from his novela on his portable.

 

“Gimme a sec,” She says ironing out the bills and counting out the cents on the counter. She’s a dollar short.

 

“No credit, you know the rules Roni.” He must have some sixth sense for this.

 

“Yeah, I..”

 

“You dropped this.” Jean Forrester says behind her. A dollar bill between two fingers that she can’t be sure is hers. There’s flour on her neck and a look in the green of her eye. Roni doesn’t want to think about this.

 

“Thanks.” She replies with her eyes finding Hope in her stroller wriggling towards her. It makes Roni turn her back on them all the quicker and pay already.

 

“Those things will kill you, you know?” Jean tells her just as she is pocketing the cigarettes into her jacket.

 

“Maybe,” Roni finds her lips curling and her voice dropping all on their own. “But not before you, right?”

 

Jean laughs and the baby squeals at the sound. “Right.”

 

“See you around, Forrester.”  And really, there was nothing she could do about that smile.

 

* * *

 

It’s Thursday night, sixteen days and there is no end in sight to her counting. The bar’s murmur is growing and it’s not the usual brand of it. Roni doesn’t like it altogether. There are too many clicks on keyboards, and her door has opened out of time and too often. But she tries to ignore it, business is business. Any money is good money. Maybe her old man had said it, but she can’t hear his voice. Roni changes an old record to the B side and is glad that at least something remains the same. Joe, at the end of the bar, raises his finger. Fill it up, he means. He’ll do that two more times and then he’ll want his coffee.

 

Roni only does this on Thursdays, only for him. He used to come in with his wife. Celia, that was her name. Back when the floors hadn’t been so old and it had been good for a dance. She had never been much for it and maybe only heard the music through the walls but it’d been something then. A little more laughter, she wants to say. Less drinks poured on a bar and more balanced on hands. Carried out onto the sidewalks to checkerboards and soda crates. Still, Roni isn’t too sure about these things. She just busies herself making her one pot of coffee, the old way. The only way her old man made it. On an old beaten metal pot on a hot plate and a cloth filter to the rhythm of congas and guitars.

 

“Heeeey.” A stranger’s voice comes from behind.

 

Roni uses the mirror behind her bottles to get a look at him. Over groomed mustache, blue eyes under glasses she doesn’t think he needs.

 

“Yeah?” She doesn’t turn around.

 

“Noticed you’re brewing coffee there,” He puts his elbows on the bar and she feels a pop in her forehead. “Mind if I give you a few tips?”

 

“I’m good. I’ve made coffee before.” The water is barely boiling when she decides to face him.

 

“This place would make a great café. It’s got good bones.”  He scans the brick and the water stain on the ceiling.

 

“Are you gonna order a drink or not?” It’s obvious he is incapable of taking a damn hint.

 

“Do you have any craft beers?”

 

“No,” Roni might murder him. “What you see is what you get.”

 

“Ah. I’ll have a Belgian then.” He rolls up his sleeves and she can tell he’s one of those who moved into Belfry’s first project. The rustic industrial or whatever the hell she marketed them as.

 

Roni hands him the most expensive bottled beer she’s got. It won’t make a difference to him and she can at least rip him off.

 

He takes one sip and smacks his lips.

 

“I’d really play something else if I were you,” He says somehow having her confused with some gringa. “It’s kind of killing the whole vibe right now.”

 

“Is it?”

 

“Yeah I mean, the place needs a more alternative sound, you know? Less...Charo.” He chuckles like he hadn’t picked up the joke from a late night rerun and gotten all his facts wrong.

 

The water boils and hisses behind her.

 

“Get out.” Roni doesn’t blink when she says it.

 

“Excuse me?”

 

“Get the hell out of my bar.” The pot is whistling now and that is about all she can hear.

 

“You can’t kick me out.” He crosses his arms, so sure of himself.

 

She laughs because there is nothing like an asshole that is about to get what’s coming to him for the first time in his life.

 

“The hell I can’t, _Chad_.” Roni grabs the bat she keeps under bar.

 

He drops his beer on the ground and slips on it as tries to outrun her. He’s made it to the door when she reaches him. Roni makes him stumble out onto the sidewalk with just three steps.

 

“Are you insane?!” He shrieks lifting his arms to protect his face.

 

“Yeah and tell everyone you know! ” She swings her bat behind her and watches him scramble away from her.

 

Roni lets a breathy laugh. She didn’t know how much she’d needed that, maybe it’d been too much. But it feels good, to take control even in the craziest way possible. She looks across the street, her arms resting on the bat. Roni should have known better because she finds Jean leaning out her window, shaking her head. Her hair is loose around her shoulders and her arms are bare. Roni’s frozen in her spot on the concrete. There’s a pull in her gut that tells her she’s only in denial.Suddenly she sees blonde hair falling on Jean’s face, it’s the early morning Sun hitting her. Not a dying streetlight. She’s looking up at her too. It’s a memory she’s too slow to catch and keep. What are they that she remembers this and can’t tear her eyes away? That air suddenly smells like cinnamon and she can hardly breathe.

 

Roni manages to half wave at her and Jean is the one fighting a smile now. She can tell somehow, it’s like she always could.

 

* * *

 

It’s too hot to stay inside on a Sunday. No one can afford a window unit with the hike in _everything_ in Hyperion Heights. They’ve resigned themselves to braving it out on the sidewalk with a couple of umbrellas and lawn chairs.

 

“It’s like I never left New Orleans,” Sabine says throwing her head back and fanning herself with a magazine.

 

“I blame white people for this.” Roni feels the plastic of her chair sticking to her thighs.

 

“You mean climate change?”

 

“Same difference.”

 

“I'd kill for it to rain.” Sabine snorts. “There’s a sentence I never thought I’d say.”  

 

“Maybe this will help.” Jacinda says settling a tray on beer crate Roni had brought along. “At least we have something they don’t...”

 

The ice clinks against the glass and a whole pitcher stands ready to be emptied. She wastes no time in pouring herself a drink and letting her lips be dyed a deep red. Jamaica con limón. It’s toeing the line between sweet and sour and the cool of it spreads down to her stomach.

 

“If you ever wanna handle cocktails at the bar you tell me, Jacinda.” She laughs and shakes her head. Roni knows why. Belfry and her all seeing eye. If she worked the bar she could hardly be spending Sundays with her daughter.

 

Lucy burst slams the door open and Roni smiles at the sight of her. Carrying far too much in her arms and losing a flip flop on the stoop.

 

“She’s gonna try a chalk drawing.” Jacinda whispers to her.

 

“Roni!” Lucy greets her and hastily presses a kiss to her cheek.

 

“What are you gonna draw?” Roni stuffs of chalk that’d fallen out back into her arms.

 

“You’ll see.” She says in that way that leaves her a little dumbfounded sometimes. Like there’s something she knows. A secret that maybe she’s forgotten. “Tía, can you braid my hair? Mom tried but…”

 

“We both know how that turns out.” Sabine laughs and motions her over.

 

“They like to make fun of me.” Jacinda tells her rolling her eyes.

 

Roni doesn’t know why she suddenly feels an emptiness. Like the rest of her is raging against it. Maybe it’s envy she feels when she sees Lucy sitting on Sabine’s lap with chalk spread at her feet. Her chest becomes hollow looking at Jacinda poke Sabine’s leg. Roni pours herself another glass of jamaica and nurses it like it has booze in it. Lucy kneels on a towel Jacinda had rolled for her and begins tracing a pink outline.

 

“So…” Jacinda begins. “How is it going?” She shrugs her shoulders, her voice trying too hard.

 

“Good…” She replies matching her tone.

 

“How’s the bread?” Sabine even pushes down her sunglasses to ask.

 

“The brea…” Roni bites her lips at the realization. She’s flushed but she can always blame the heat. “I’m gonna kill that boy.” She means it, she’ll use her bat on Henry Mills.

 

“That good?” Jacinda brows crosses her leg and gives her a look.

 

“There’s been no bread, I’ll have you know.”

 

“None? Like at all?”

 

“Not even...not even like a _muffin?_ ” Jacinda’s voice goes higher in disbelief.

 

“No and can we drop..”

 

“But Jean sent over banana bread with Henry yesterday. I was there.” Lucy says busy with blue lines now.

 

Jacinda and Sabine burst out laughing and toast like this proves them right.

 

“What? It’s true!” She turns around indignant.

 

“We know bébé.”

 

“Oh God.” Roni presses her glass against her forehead and it does nothing to cool her down.

 

“Looks like it’s your lucky day.” Jacinda nudges her so that she looks ahead.

 

“Jean!” Lucy gets to her feet and races toward her before Roni can make sense of Jacinda’s words.

 

Roni wishes she could melt into the sidewalk to avoid whatever is coming but it’s also been four days since she last saw her. She’s in cutoffs and a tank top, the day has her red in the face. The messy bun keeping her hair together is coming undone. Hope is in her arms with a bare feet and a hat that is a little too big for her head. A diaper bag is slipping off her shoulder. Lucy brings her to them looking as determined as she’s ever looked.

 

“I’m just getting started but maybe you can guess what it’s gonna be.” Lucy points at the colors on the ground.

 

“Uh..Hi. Everyone.” Jean says with an awkward nod. “And..hmm..a castle?” She turns to Lucy with a smile.

 

“Maaaaybe.” Lucy settles back onto her towel and picks up red this time.

 

“You could stick around and see it done.” Sabine says with slyly. 

 

“I don’t want to intrude or anything…” She shifts Hope in her arms and it’s really pointless to pretend her heart isn’t beating faster.

 

“You’re not!” Jacinda says getting to her feet. Roni wishes she could pull her by the shirt but that’d be too much. Even by her standards. “Sit, sit! I’ll go get another chair.”

 

At this point Roni is dead certain that they’re all conspiring against her.

 

“Dale.” Jacinda mouths behind Jean’s back as she eases into the empty chair, knowing she can’t even glare at her.

 

“Hey.” Jean breathes out beside her.

 

“Hey.” Roni returns and thinks they’ve been here before. Out in the overwhelming heat and stealing a moment.

 

The air is charged and it’s hard to ignore how it settles on her skin. She can’t remember a time when they had been this close but something inside her does. It’s tuned to Jean, like her frequency has been off for a whole time and it’s finally found its way back.  Hope slaps a hand to her arm and gurgles.

 

“She likes you.” Jean tells her raising her eyes and Roni can’t breathe. “I don’t know what it is.” It’s playful the way she says it, meant to hide behind.

 

“She’s a good baby.” Roni cooes lifting Hope’s chin. “She’ll like just about anyone.”

 

“You say that but she wails every time Weaver walks through the door.”

 

“That’s just good instincts.” Sabine says blowing air through her mouth.

 

They let out a laugh with the same sort of pride in it. It’s stupid, really, she knows. Because no part of Hope is hers. But Jacinda comes back with an extra chair and glass and Roni can at least pretend to put this in the back of her mind. It’s easy after that, with impressions of half the neighborhood and stories of the everyday. It all happens as Lucy adds color to the grey of the sidewalk.

 

“I swear we’re a yoga studio away from me losing my mind.” Roni says stretching in her chair.

 

“I’m already there,” Jean chest rises and she can’t help feeling it too. “I had eight different people ask me if I did quinoa bowls for lunch.”

 

“Ugh. Those are the worst,” Sabine echoes. “You know a customer lectured me on the benefits of jumping on the ‘yeast free train’. Is that a thing now?”

 

“Speak of the devil.” Jacinda lowers her eyes and knocks her knee with Sabine’s.

 

Roni sees what she means instantly, a woman is walking towards them. She’s wearing a sunhat and her lipstick is a bright red, her blonde hair is styled to look the right amount of disheveled. She doesn’t recognize her but her gourmet grocer tote bag gives her away. She stops right where Lucy’s drawing begins and Roni is afraid of what will happen next. Jacinda already has her hand on Sabine’s ready to spring if they need to.

 

“Hold her.” Jean mumbles handing Hope over to her. “Hey kid, wanna hand me the purple?” Jean kneels without seeming to care if her knees get skinned.

 

“I didn’t know this sort of thing was allowed.” The woman says, addressing no one in particular. Lucy looks up at her  and then at Jean beside her. Roni wishes she didn’t understand what is happening but she’s ten with Belfry in her family. She knows too well what’s quietly unfolding here.

 

“Good thing it is,” Jean replies filling empty spaces with purple. “Or else this sidewalk would be real ugly without it.”

 

Hope raises her little fist towards the stranger and opens it, Roni thinks she must be picking up the fire that she feels burning inside.

 

“Guess it would be.” The woman gives Jean a slight smile but doesn’t bother to look at the rest of them. She adjusts the tote in her arm and to Roni’s shock, goes into Jacinda and Sabine’s building.

 

They all breathe and lie back in their chairs again. Jean keeps coloring alongside Lucy, following her careful instructions until the Sun is about to set. Hope is asleep on her shoulder and Roni presses a kiss to the crown of her head before she can stop herself.

 

“Do you know what it is?” Lucy asks Jean who suddenly looks struck.

 

“Ch..” Her voice breaks. “Chapter four of Henry’s book, right?”

 

“Yeah!”

 

Roni’s eyes drop to really look at it for the first time. It’s a pink sunset, somewhere far away. A big apple tree in the background, alone in a garden. There is a white and blue castle by her feet, torches of fire by its drawbridge. Her eyes water and she doesn’t get it. Doesn't get why the emptiness inside her is gone just like that. With the baby in her arms, looking at Jean and her red knees sitting by Lucy’s apple tree.

 

“It’s beautiful.” Roni whispers rocking with Hope.

 

Lucy smiles and Jean... She can’t escape her gaze.

 

* * *

 

Roni forgot her breakfast this morning. It’s just coffee and scrambled eggs where she can still see the white but it’s gets her to the afternoon. Her stomach practically growls and she curses when she discovers she has nothing left over from Jean’s. And with that decides to brave lunch hour, she can’t take it much longer. She isn’t too mindful with her steps, doesn’t look where she’s going just instinctively ends up across the street. But something’s off, she can hear it. There’s a crowd that sounds like a whole stadium. It’s a mess of overalls and flannels and people trying to order over each other. Roni elbows her way into the shop and finally lays eyes on Jean. Her hands are white with flour and one is curled into a fist. There are too many people up in her space.

 

“I NEED you to step the hell off.” She looks ready to jump over the counter and land a punch on a guy’s face. “This isn’t the goddamn place to..”

 

“Is that seriously how you want to talk to a customer? I came here because there was a buzz online...”

 

“Do I look like I give a damn?!”

 

Hope begins to cry in her pen and that’s it. That’s Jean breaking point, Roni knows it. She puts two fingers in her mouth and whistles loud enough to make everyone but Hope go quiet.

 

“Right. You’re gonna line up in ONE single file. You’re gonna look at your phones until it’s time to order things that are actually on the menu. You’ll pay and then get out.”

 

“And _who_ are you?” It comes from a girl with a credit card already out in her hand.

 

“Your worst nightmare if you don’t do as I say.”

 

Roni sighs in relief when she sees Sabine and Jacinda rushing into the shop.

 

“What can we do?” Sabine asks pulling her hair into a bun.

 

“Help me behind the counter.” Jean says. Roni has never seen her like this, so desperate she might cry.

 

“Jacinda take the baby. I’ll handle the register.”

 

Hope is still fussy when Jacinda takes her out on her stroller but it’s for the best. The three of them fall into a pace. Sabine penning down orders and wrapping them up when Jean is done with them. It’s good that Jean is busy at the old table she uses as a workstation, away from everyone. Roni finds herself looking over her shoulder  every other minute, make sure she’s still alright. She bites her lips whenever she notices the outlines of her muscles and the beads of sweat on her neck. By the end of the hour her lips are sore and the line is thinning out.

 

“She says you need to eat before you kill someone for not carrying cash.” Sabine whispers as she slides a plate to her. Roni can smell that cheddar again.

 

“Like she’s one to talk.” She rolls her eyes to keep the smile off her face. It earns her a pat on the shoulder and an disbelieving sigh.

 

Roni takes bites of her sandwich in between customers, too hungry to care if she’s speaking with her mouth full. She doesn’t know how long it takes her to eat the whole thing, just grabs a soda for herself when her throat feels grainy and dry.

 

“Looks like things are going back to normal,” Sabine unties the apron off her waist. “I think it’s safe if I head out now.”

 

“Yeah, yeah.” Jean doesn’t know how to thank her, it’s easy to tell. “I..uh. You’re a lifesaver.”  

 

“Not just me.” Sabine winks at her.

 

Roni can do nothing about it but lock her jaw and count a customer’s change. She watches her leave knowing that they’re practically alone now. Her heart is in her throat and in another hour she won't be able to justify staying. But she does. Stays until people are shopping for the bread they’ll have for dinner. Roni flips the sign on the door when it’s five and the lights at the bar are still off. She wants to find Jean and say goodbye. Not call that running away. Two bottles are uncapped in the backroom and Jean comes out with two beers.

 

“Fuck today.” She says handing her one.

 

Roni takes a sip and cringes. It’s too sweet for a beer. “Forrester, if you had a liquor licence I’d take it away.”

 

“If you don’t want it…” Her fingers reach for the bottle.

 

“No,” Roni steps back and takes a swig of it. “Fuck today.”

 

Jean smiles and it’s the widest she’s seen it. It’s been ten days since Sunday and walking back home with the baby beginning to stir in her arms. Ten days since she last looked at her. A month since she began crossing out her days, counting down. Jean falls back against the counter and slides onto the floor.

 

“I think this is the kid trying to help,” She says bringing a knee up to her chest and holding her bottle by its neck. “Henry, I mean.”

 

Roni nods. “I had a feeling. Heard him talking about using his podcast for good.” Her shoulders drop as she joins her on the floor.  “He knows about the rent increase.”

 

“Yeah well. Belfrey’s a bitch. If I make ends meet this month she’ll just…”

 

“Add another 20.”

 

“What am I gonna do? This is all I have. All I can give Hope.”

 

“We’ll find a way to get rid of Belfrey,” Roni tells her like she has never believed in anything more. “Call the IRS or something.”

 

Jean laughs, defeated. She lets her head hit the back of the counter.

 

“If worse comes to worse you can always take half my bar,” All the air in her lungs leaves her and she’s light headed realizing she means the words. She takes another swig from the bottle. “I have better beer anyway.”

 

“You’re not serious.”

 

“I kinda am.” Roni focuses on a stain on the wall, not bearing to face Jean.

 

“Why?” It’s quiet, almost not there.

 

“Belfrey’s a bitch, right?”

 

“Roni…” Her name sounds wrong, like a word that’s been said too many times.

 

There’s an abrupt and insistent knock on the door.

 

“Son of bitch we’re closed.” Jean mutters moving to confront whoever it is that’s rattling the door knob.

 

Roni grabs her by the wrist. “They’ll go away.”

 

“But…”

 

“Trust me. They’ll go away.”

 

She stays frozen but itching to let out her frustrations on whatever jackass can’t read the sign. The knocking stops after a minute that is too long.

 

“See?”

 

Jean falls back with Roni’s hand still around her wrist. They’re an inch away from each other and there’s a voice telling her to get up and leave. But she can’t do it, not when Jean touches her forehead to hers.

 

“Yeah. I see.” It’s like she breathed the words into her.

 

Roni kisses her. When her teeth are grazing her lips she realizes that this is what why she’d been counting the days. What had been at the end of the line. It doesn’t make sense. Not the way she can’t remember if this their first kiss. It doesn’t feel like it, it’s sinking into her pillow after a long day. Melting chocolate and warm milk. It feels like it when tripping over the stairs to the bedroom and when pants are kicked off their ankles. When shirts go over their heads. They’ve been here before, somehow. Her fingers remember all the hidden patterns on Jean’s skin, the stretch marks on her hips. Below her navel. That scar at the back of her knee. Jean keeps one hand locked in hers because she’s always liked that, smiles against her skin because she’s never been able to help herself.

 

They’ve been here before.

* * *

 

 

They had been kids together. Maybe sixteen and fooling around in the back of cars that weren’t theirs. It’s not quite right. Too easy. Jean knows that, knows she can’t trust her memory about Roni. She can’t remember anything before she started wrapping up bread for her and Henry’s knowing nod. Still doesn't know why they fell out all those years ago. When she tries to look past the fog there’s an emptiness at the pit of her stomach. It’s cold and it spreads, it leaves her gasping for air. Jean doesn’t try too often, not when Roni’s been coming in every day at lunch to scare people into line. It’s easy, she figures. To not think about that when she’s standing there with a hand in her back pocket. Jean doesn’t think at all when it’s closing time and her hands fall on Roni's hips.

 

It’s Hope babbling away in Roni’s arms that makes her brace herself. Jean hadn’t seen the first time when she’d been soaked to the bone and ready to explode. But she had when Roni had her lips pressed against her head and she could only watch with the sidewalk hot underneath her legs. They belong together, that’s all she knows. It doesn’t make sense but a whole lot doesn’t in this neighborhood. They don’t talk about it. They aren’t good at that, probably never have been. But they know there about the gaps and memories that are gone as soon as they came. Jean needs to believe that it doesn’t matter. Who and what they were to each other.

 

“I could start opening up the bar, you know?” Henry tells Roni with smirk. “That way you don’t have to rush out of here.”

 

Roni glares at him like she doesn’t want to admit defeat. Jean wipes her window and wonders what it might have been like if Henry had been one of those who walks away.

 

“You’re there every day so you might as well.” She turns to the notebook to write the day’s total. Roni tries to hide it sometimes, how much she cares for him. Henry always sees through it.

 

“Ouch.” He says with hand to his chest. “And if you ever need me and Jacinda to babysit…”

 

“Jesus fucking Christ, kid.”  Jean breathes out wiping her hands on her apron.

 

“You wanna open the bar?” Roni tosses him her keys and he catches them with a laugh. “Start today.”

 

He makes for the door and with his hand on the door knob throws Roni one last look.

 

“There’s a white handprint on your butt, by the way.” He bites his lips when he sees Roni readying herself to chase after him. “Bye!”

 

The bell is still ringing and Jean's too warm inside her clothes to do anything but stutter.

 

“He...umm..”

 

“Is a dead man.” Roni says and Hope squeals at her words. She picks her up and smiles looking so like a mother. Jean feels her lungs and knees caving in. “You know that don’t you? You do.” Roni says softly. Hope gets a hold of her glasses and tries pulling them down.

 

They fit together every afternoon just like this. With Henry stopping by and Roni humming a song only she knows. With Hope in her pen and Jean sneaking glances at them. It doesn’t matter who and what they were. She's more now, more than just the neighborhood baker.  It’s what she tells herself because this is something. A something that could go away if pushed too hard.

* * *

 

The air is all steam and she almost slips stepping out of the shower. Jean wipes her mirror as usual not really thinking until her eyes stay on her reflection a little too long. She hadn’t thought about how she looked like for a long time. Her fingers inspect her face and she knows it’s odd to think that she doesn’t look familiar. Like she doesn’t recognize herself. Not the color of her hair or the shape of her mouth. It makes her wonder what Roni sees if she’s just standing here feeling like a stranger. Jean takes a deep breath and wraps a towel around her chest. She tries to smile and at least that is something that feels hers.

 

She shivers as she enters her bedroom, leaving a trail of wet footprints. Roni is sitting on her bed with her boots off. Henry’s book is in her hand, her finger keeping her from losing the page. Jean recognizes it from the way she’d folded a corner, she knows there are three underlined sentences there. The lone apple tree. Roni doesn’t say a word, just watches her rummage through her closet for a clean shirt. Feeling her gaze makes her feel like less of a stranger in her own skin. They’ve done this before. It's enough that Roni recognizes her. It makes her drop her towel without a second thought, step into her underwear.

 

“Ready to go?” Jean asks lacing up her tennis shoes.

 

“Yeah.” Her hand slips from the book. She doesn’t know why the way she presses her lips together makes her think of Regina Mills, the way Henry wrote her. But Roni is nothing like Regina,  she is nothing like Emma. “Are you sure you’re OK with this? We could always call Jacinda and Henry…”

 

“I don’t think you can take another week of the kid’s hints,” Jean runs a hand through her hair. “And I’m OK.”

 

Roni wrings her hands together. “They’re keeping Hope overnight. It isn’t the forty minutes while you shout at Belfrey or…”

 

Jean laughs. “Are _you_ OK?”

 

“Yeah. Course I am.” She pulls her jacket on and pushes down whatever it is she’s thinking. Jean knows she isn’t blind, that there’s a reason she turns when she catches her reflection with Hope in her arms. “Let’s go.”

 

There aren’t a lot of places to go with ten dollars to spare but they manage to step outside the neighborhood. A chill goes down her back as soon as they cross from the troll and graffiti under the bridge. The Sun’s down and it’s Sunday night, the only night they can afford to do this. When the shop’s closed and Roni doesn’t open the bar. They walk shoulder to shoulder with their hands brushing but not really touching. Maybe they’ve never done tthis.Walk down to a marina just because. Roni doesn’t let her so much as search for change when they stop by a burger shack.

 

“I’ll get it next time.” Jean promises as she puts a lid on their sodas.

 

“Yeah, next time.” Roni replies rolling down the top of the paper bags. She doesn’t mean it, Jean can always tell with her. Roni’s been keeping the day’s total for weeks now.

 

They sit on a bench facing the water. The smell of the water and their knees against each other is something she knows. Remembers even, but she isn’t sure. Jean thinks they could have talked about getting out here in a place like this once. But the fog begins to fall on her and she doesn’t want to think about it anymore.

 

“Last time I walked this far I was out looking for Lucy,” Roni says wiping at her hands with a napkin. “Didn’t really stop to look at the view.”

 

The moon lights up the water, jumps off the white of the boats. City lights behind them make the night look yellow and orange. It looks to Jean like it doesn’t end, everything blurs into the dark of the night.

 

“I can’t even imagine what that must’ve been like.” Jean thinks of her baby who still needs her for everything. Who could run away when she’s ten because she can’t make sense of herself.

 

“Jacinda was torn between pulling her into a hug and locking her in a tower when she came back.” Her laugh is sad underneath. “I’d be the same.”  

 

“Please. You’re too soft for that.” It’s out of her mouth before she realizes. It’s a push and the ground could shift beneath them. Just like that.

 

“Is that what you think?” Roni arches her brow and Jean sighs in relief. “That I’m too soft?”

 

“You don’t scare me, Pérez.”  Jean bumps her shoulder with hers.

 

“This is the worst night of my life.” She smiles in spite of herself.

 

“Man, you really know how to sweet talk a woman.” Her thumb goes to catch a fleck of orange sauce on Roni’s cheek.

 

“You make it easy.”  Roni sounds out of breath looking at her.

 

Jean thinks that she might have stopped breathing too. This could be new, them out in the night together like this.Her heart in her throat is not. She tries taking her hand to see what it does then, if it gets any quieter. Roni locks their fingers together making her ears ring with her pulse. It’s like they’re blurring into the night along with the lights and the water.

 

“Come on, let’s go.” Roni whispers on her neck.

 

She lets Roni’s hand guide her back, trust that her pulse will get them back to their street. Streetlights change the look on her face with each step, it's like a spell. Jean’s too deep in it that to catch any words said between them. Her quiet laugh makes her think of a forest, somewhere. Jean is being lead there too. Roni voice is hushed whispers, walking in secret. _Just like old times, I suppose._ Jean hears it clearly but doesn’t know if it’s something of theirs or an underlined line in Henry’s book. Roni squeezes her hand and they’re standing at her door. She fumbles with the keys until she manages to get the door open. It’s not a race up the stairs, it’s careful. It’s brushing their teeth at the sink. It’s unbuttoning jeans and unstrapping bras. Feeling newly washed sheets over them. It’s Roni falling asleep with her head on her chest.

 

The yeast wakes her up at four like it always does. Monday morning, whatever spell they had last night is almost broken. Jean moves slowly, trying to not stir Roni awake.

 

“Hey.” She says with her eyes half open.

 

“Hey. I didn’t wanna wake you.”

 

“You didn’t.” Her throat sounds dry and the curls of her hair are looser around her face. “Time to start the day.”

 

Jean presses a kiss to the top of her head because it’s four in the morning and things could change. One way or another. Roni can feel it too, she thinks. She takes a good look at her bedroom because she could be gone next month with the way her numbers are barely off the red. Hope’s crib she’d bought at a flea market and rolled down the street. Unpolished floors and thin curtains. The rust at the foot of her bed frame.

 

“You don’t have to be up with me.”

 

“I know,” Roni yawns and kisses her jaw. “I’m waiting for you to get to work and let me have the bed all to myself.”

 

“You’re the worst.”

 

“You’re horrible at pillow talk.” She slips away from her and gives her a kick to the shins. “Get to it.”

 

“Yes, Your Majesty.” The words slip out, inching them towards something Jean doesn’t understand. Roni hides face face with a pillow and the room is too quiet.

 

She gets into her work clothes and only stops to look at Roni’s window across the street. The lights are off.If it comes to it, she’ll be across the street with Hope in her arms and Roni stretched out on the bed. There used to be a pull of sadness when her mind wandered into that corner. Strong and unexplained. Jean hadn't wanted to know. It's not like that now. It should scare her but she gets to work before it can. Forgets when her hands sink into the dough.

* * *

 

 

It hits them like a freight train they saw coming. They have a week until the end of the month, one more week in her old place. Not even lunch hour could help her keep up with Belfrey, not even asking for a price cut on _anything_ worked. Roni had only drummed her fingers on the counter and given her a look. Until she’d uncapped a beer and handed it to her on Friday night.

 

“So,” Jean had taken a deep breath. “You have better beer, right?”

 

“Yeah,” Roni had beamed and she hadn’t known what to do with that. “Better mattress too.”

 

It’d sounded easy. But they hadn’t thought about ovens, gas, and everything in between. They’d only stopped to consider Hope and how many bottles to keep away from her. It took Jean pulling out her crowbar and setting it on the counter when Carlisle had come sniffing around to get them moving. To rush everything Belfrey can’t claim as hers across the street. The bar’s mess gets bigger with each trip but Roni doesn’t say a word. Scowls at anyone who so much looks at her stuff in the wrong way. It should scare her because it feels like a house of cards. But it’s a week until the end of the month. She can’t afford to be afraid, she doesn’t want to be. Because this is her something.

 

“Have you considered painting?” Henry asks Roni fixing the leg on her old working station.

 

“No.” Roni answers pushing a box into place.

 

“OK but it’d really separate the spaces and it’d look like…”  

 

“Harvey Dent and Two Face? I don’t think so.”  She says holding up her hand and looking like she doesn’t know where the words came from.

 

“Jean?” Henry turns to her with a pleading look. “At least call her out for that reference.”

 

Roni puts a hand on her hip and it’s clear what she means when she kisses her teeth. “Nope. Not getting involved in this.” She bounces Hope in her arms and her happy sounds are enough to get her off the hook.

 

“Wow,” He says and there is something so familiar about his expression. “After all the bread I delivered to make this happen. This is betrayal.”

 

Jean sticks out her tongue at him and Roni rolls her eyes. It’s not something new, it’s something from the back of her mind. It’s like she had forgotten it. Them, she thinks.

 

“If you want to make yourself useful…” Roni stops mid-sentence and her mouth twists into a snarl. “Ivy.”  

 

She turns and finds Ivy Belfrey behind them. With her pressed clothes and hair. Jean can smell the expensive perfume she’s wearing from where she’s standing. Ivy steps forward and runs a finger along her work station.

 

“The door was open. I thought I’d drop in and see how it’s going.” She smiles and looks from Henry to Roni. Like she’s trying to stick a knife into her.

 

“What the hell do you want, Ivy?” Jean asks still bouncing Hope. “Came to gloat?”

 

“No, no. I came to...well I really respect what you’re doing here.”

 

“Cut the crap.” Roni tells her.

 

Ivy sighs in mock disappointment. “This is a good effort to stick it to my mother. It’s too bad it won’t go far.”

 

“Ivy, what do you mean?” Henry hasn’t moved from his spot on the floor. Jean can’t see what sliver of decency he’s found in her.

 

“She may have plans to call an inspector here and shut the whole thing down. Not just your little _merger._ But the bar itself. Take away your liquor licence, never get you a permit. Whatever money can buy around these parts.”

 

Jean knows this the wind that makes this house of cards tumble down. Her ears begin to ring and Hope pulls at her shirt. Like she’s trying to snap her out of it.

 

“And what? You came her out of the goodness of your heart?” Jean spits out.

 

“No,” Ivy smiles again and it sparks something in her. The same thing that makes her curl her fists. “My mother keeps a safe at our offices. I know whatever she has inside is bound to...I don’t know...put her away for good?”  

 

“Let me guess. You want one of us to get it for you?” Roni’s jaw is tense and her back is straight.

 

“I always knew you were too smart to just tend bar.”

 

“Why?” Henry intervenes before Roni tears her apart.

 

“I hate my mother and I nobody wants her out of here more than I do.”

 

“And you’re too much of a coward to get your hands dirty.” Roni snipes while Jean thinks she might start to shake with anger.

 

“That’s one way to look at it.” Ivy scans the place with an intention she can’t figure out. “What do you say, Jean? How about we help each other out?”

 

“If you think you can just walk in and…”

 

“I’ll do it.” Roni cuts in before she can tell Ivy to go to hell.

 

“ _Roni_.” Henry says sounding too young for his age. Like he’s begging her not to go.

 

“You can’t. Roni, you can’t honestly..no. No.” Jean finds her feet and walks over to her. Hope reaches for her and Roni just runs her thumb on her chin.

 

“I’m not really asking,” She tells her firmly. “Besides, I’m the one in this room that has less to lose.”  Roni kisses the top of the baby’s head, knowing that what she just said is bullshit. Some kind of martyr bullshit.

 

“Let’s get this over with.” Jean can’t even get a word in before they’re out the door.

 

* * *

 

It’s almost ten when she hears the bar door close. It’s been six hours since Roni had left with Ivy. She’d sharpened knives and hammered things into place for the first three hours as Henry paced around the bar with Hope drooling on his shoulder. Jean had paced upstairs in Roni’s bedroom, digging her nails into her skin. Thinking she should have stopped her, thinking she might be somewhere with cuffs around her wrists. It’d been Hope’s cries and swaying her back to sleep on Roni’s bed that had made her doze off. Jean lays down the baby in her crib and races downstairs on socked feet. Roni is sitting at the bar, two empty glasses in front of her. She hadn’t been alone. Her fingers wipe at her eyes before she drops her head to her chest.

 

“Roni? Roni..what’s wrong?” Jean asks with a strangled voice barely keeping it together.

 

Her head snaps and her hands fall flat on the bar, like she’s got something to hide. “Ivy just left. It turns out the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree.” Her words sound too thought out.

 

“What happened?”

 

“We got what we wanted.” Roni tells her without moving from her spot. “Belfrey shouldn’t be a problem anymore.” She breathes out. “The day just took a toll on me.”  

 

Jean steps closer. Seeing her hunched over like this makes her look so small.

 

“Is that all this is?” A voice inside her head tells her not to push. To let things go, accept them. Because it could all go away. “The _day_?”  

 

Roni’s eyes are brittle when one hand cups her cheek. “Yes. That’s all this is, I’ll be fine.”

 

“You’d tell me if something was the matter, right?” On instinct her lips find her hand. It makes Roni pull it away with a pained look in her eye.

 

“Of course.” She gives a weak smile. “Go back upstairs. I’ll close up down here.”  

 

Jean nods feeling that pull again, feeling that everything is close to collapsing. But not yet, not yet. Roni doesn’t know she lingers by stairs and watches her put hand over her mouth. Trying to catch her breath. She only leaves when the stool at the bar scratches the floor. She steps out of her jeans and gets under the covers. Roni comes in and avoids her eyes. It feels different when she slides in next to her. Their legs don’t touch, their hands don’t even brush against each other. And it’s quiet. Too quiet.

 

“We should get some sleep.” It’s what she says before shutting off the light and lying there awake. Jean can feel her thinking but she listens to that voice. Because things can’t come crashing down on her. Not like this.

 

That voice grows louder with each day, each day Roni feels farther away from her. When her lips become a thin line after Jean kisses her. When she looks away when she’s searching a box for a clean shirt. Like she can’t recognize her, doesn’t see what she sees before. It makes her feel like a stranger lying next to her, when she measures her words. And even then they sound off, Jean can tell. She can always tell with her. She wants to think she could live with it, with the way she only squeezed her hand in the morning. The way afternoons aren’t the same and the way she tries not to cry when Hope is in her arms. But by the end of the week that voice is shouting over everything, shouting for her to let things go. To let her memories get clouded with that fog and live with a Roni who won’t look at her. Jean thinks or remembers she’s never been good at being told what to do.

 

“Can we talk?” It sounds broken when she asks sitting at the foot bed.

 

“About what?” Her tone is practiced but her shoulders are tense. Roni’s holding her breath.

 

“Us. About why  hell you can’t even look me in the eye right now.” It’s still broken but it’s gotten angry and desperate.”

 

“I..Em..Jean. It’s just been…” Roni stands away from her by her old dresser.

 

“A long day?” It’s been too many of those lately.” Tears sting her eyes.

 

“I don’t think I can explain. I want to.”

 

“Just. Please. Just try because...I can’t even remember a time before this,” Jean can’t stop herself now. She should have known she would do this herself. “I’ve tried. I’ve tried to think of what we had before...I don’t know half the time. And. Fuck. I don’t even _care_ …” She tightens her grasp on the sheets, like it’d help her any. “I don’t care what we were before. Can’t we just fix this and..”  

 

Roni shakes her head and she’s blinking away tears. Looking sorry, maybe for what she’s about to do. Jean doesn’t know if she’ll survive it. Not after all this. Everything.

 

“What about Hope’s father?” Roni asks wrapping her hands around herself. She asks like she knows the answer but Jean doesn’t. Like this is supposed to piece something together. Her eyes travel from Hope asleep in her crib and back to her.

 

“There isn’t one.” Jean says on instinct. It’s the truth, it’s the first time she’s given it any thought. The words tasted like heavy apple cider on her tongue and it makes her see fire in a chimney somewhere. In a room far away from here.

 

“Haven’t we been here before?”

 

“What?” They’re both barely breathing.

 

Roni turns around and opens a drawer. Her hand shakes as she lifts socks and scarves to get what she wants. She kneels by her legs as if she’s worried she’d run out of the room. Roni sets a polaroid on her lap. Jean blinks and blinks when she looks at it but it doesn’t disappear. It doesn’t melt into her skin like it would in a dream. Jean is looking back at herself in the polaroid. It’s the color of her hair and the shape of her mouth. Her tongue is out and her hair is loose on her shoulders. Her forehead is pressed against a boy’s, no more than seventeen. Next to him someone is pressing a kiss to his cheek. It’s Roni, with her hair coiffed but curling at the ends. Her lips are painted a shade red they’ve never been. Jean turns the polaroid over and finds her handwriting. _Swan-Mills Graduation Trip 2017!!_

 

“What...what is this?” She chokes thinking of Emma. Of Regina who loved her but tried not to for so many years. The fairy tale she couldn’t finish reading when it came down to it. Of lines from Henry’s book that bleed into what she wants to be memories. “Who..is that kid?”

 

“Henry. Our son.” Roni says gently and Jean gapes at her. “I promise it’ll all make sense soon. You just need to trust me.”  

 

“Is this some sick fucking joke?!” Jean steps past away from her and puts as much distance as she can between them.

 

“Emma, please…” Roni begs, her eyes widening.

 

“What did you just call me?” Her heart is pounding everywhere, the room is becoming darker and smaller.

 

Roni stays silent and gazes at her in a way that cuts through her. The voice shouts at her, leave. Ignore that pull in her gut. Run, run. Run to the way things were. Back to the fog. Where there is nothing to remember.

 

“You...you stay away from us.” She tells her taking Hope from her crib. Jean stalks past her and doesn’t bother closing any doors behind her.

 

“Shhh. It’s gonna be OK baby. Just you and me.” Jean whispers through her tears and over her daughter’s cries crossing the street.. “Like it was before.”

 

She can barely unlock the old shop, that used to be hers. Tomorrow it will be someone else’s. Her steps echo in its new emptiness, the wood creaks as she goes up the stairs. Her old bedroom is bare except for the stained mattress. The mattress that isn’t hers and she cries along with her daughter. She wishes the fog would lift, that she could remember who and what they were. In spite of that voice because it matters now, now that she has nothing. Now that she’s back here with less than what she had. Jean tries for hours, until her tears dry and her daughter has resigned herself to quieter cries. Emma. E-m-m-a. Emma. It plays on a single loop for hours in a room that’s not hers. The light across the street goes on, like it always did. Roni’s still there, awake like she is.

 

Jean takes a deep breath and feels stronger than the voice that commands her to stay. Her legs are weak as she makes her way back carrying Hope in tired arms. Her feet are light going up the bar’s stairs and she’s quiet slipping into the bedroom. Roni is on the floor, her knees up to her chest. Her face buried in between her arms, she doesn’t know she’s come back. 

 

“Why do you always turn on your light at this hour?" Jean feels her throat ache with the question.

 

Roni looks up at her, eyes wide. Opens her mouth only to close it. Like she wanted to tell the truth but changed her mind.

 

“Tell me.”

 

A tentative smile that’s gone too quickly when she lays eyes on Hope. “It’s the time she needs her diaper changed. I suppose it just stuck with me. I’d wake up two hours after having gone to bed not knowing why. Why I felt I was forgetting something.”

 

Jean sits on the bed before she falls over. Every morning at four, every morning at four for as long as she could remember. She sees stone walls and tents in the woods, sees them coming in through the fog. But not quite reaching her. Jean thinks of Roni who can’t be Regina. With the curls in her hair and the way she stands with her hands in her pockets. With a temper that gets the best of her, who hated her not so long ago. Roni who went with Ivy without thinking twice of what might happen to her and came back. Regina.

 

“You say Henry’s our son?” Jean breathes out. “That everything in his book...everything is real?”

 

Roni. Regina. Roni lies her head back against the mattress, avoiding her knee. “His heart is poisoned and..Emm..Jean.” Her voice cracks. “If the curse breaks...he’ll die. And I can’t do this alone. I’m not...I can’t. Not without you.”  

 

She lifts a glass up to her with a clear liquid in it, looking ashamed she’s even doing it. “I need you to trust me. One last time.”

 

Jean lays Hope in between two pillows and takes the glass. She looks it over, watching it slip from side to side.

 

“If I drink this I’ll be her again? I’ll be Emma?”

 

Roni. Regina. Roni smiles that small smile again. Eyes brimming with tears. “Not that I don’t love Jean but yes. You’ll be Emma again.”

 

Jean nods and downs it before she can think better of it. She can’t breathe, all the air has been sucked out her. She sees a forest and sees Regina. Roni. Regina drop everything and run to greet her. She feels her hands on hers. Early morning and Regina’s hands on her hips inside a tent. Laughing and saying things she’d never thought she’d say. She feels her womb grow and the words _true love’s child, can you believe it?_ float in the air when the baby cries on her naked chest. Lucy climbs onto her back trailing the woods one afternoon and she can barely hold her. There’s the dark smoke of a curse and Henry lying on the ground, his head on Ella’s lap. _I love you_ is whispered against her neck before the curse swallows them. Before she wakes up across the street and a light is turned just in time. Every damn day. Cursed to be nothing but the neighborhood baker. 

 

She lets the glass slip from grasp and roll onto the floor. Dark brown eyes are pinned on her, trembling hands on her knees. Waiting for her to say something. Anything.

 

“Hi.” She pulls Regina up onto her lap and folds in her arms.

 

"Emma." Regina says into her hair. Like before. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I totally stole a scene from That Damn Donna Reed episode from Gilmore Girls because I am all kinds of trash.


End file.
